Odoo : Odoo is a Business Management Software which includes CRM, Billing, Sales, Purchase Manufacturing, Accounting, Warehouse, Project Management, Inventory Management, and E-Commerce. Odoo – open source ERP is the leading open-source solution and it was released under the AGPL license.
Inventory Management Module : Inventory Management or control is the most important aspect of any business. In order to run a successful business, you’ll need proper inventory management support.
Through this inventory management solution we can determine our company’s fate. It is intended to scale from a few thousands of operations to many various transactions. This the best double entry integrated inventory & tracking system for warehouse management. With this module you can manage your warehouse, vendors, purchase flows etc.
Odoo has one of the greatest inventory management platforms available, and it can be used without any investment in implementation, customization, or integration, ensuring corporate success.
Odoo Inventory aids in the coordination of all inventory-related operations such as delivery, replenishment, batch transfer, landed cost management, scrap management, product and product variant management, serial number and barcode usage, warehouse analysis, inventory report generation, inventory valuation, and so on.
OpenERP Warehouse management app or module is based on the concept of double entry which has revolutionized accounting also. OpenERP Warehouse Inventory management feature is as plain as consumption, loss, movement of one product to another location.
Another advantage of OpenERP warehouse management is that you get proper insights for quick decision making.
In this blog we will guide you for inventory management workflow.
When you click on the inventory moule you can see the inventory overview. Overview is the name of the module dashboard. You can see this below screen for inventory overview.
This overview page gives us an idea of the many operation patterns. You can see the various types of processes in the above figure, like Receipts, Delivery Orders, Returns, Manufacturing, POS Orders and many more. For the warehouse, operation types are created. Based on these operation kinds, we may set up rules for our routes.
First step in Inventory is to create a product. For this you have to go to the Inventory > Products > Create
When you click on create you can see the below figure :
Product Name : Name of the product.
Product Type : If you set the product type as ‘Storable’ then you can track the stock of the product and know how many units are in stock and what’s the forecasted number units. If you want to include a product on receipts/deliveries but don’t not need to track it’s stock then you can select type ‘Consumable’. This will help you to set up Product in inventory management.
Configuration of Warehouse : Warehouse is the place where items are stored. You can set up multiple warehouses. We can have a warehouse for a company and we can keep different locations in the same.
To set up a warehouse you can go to Inventory > Configuration > Warehouses.
When you click on a warehouse you can see the list of warehouses. Right now there is only one warehouse but you can create as much as you need.
Click on the warehouse’s option to view your Warehouses and manage them. You can have all advanced features on the warehouse management there as shown in the screenshot given below.
If you want to create a new warehouse then you have to enable a multi warehouse setting. To enable multi warehouse you can go to Inventory > Configuration > Setting > Enable Multi-Step Routes.
After enabling the multi-warehouse settings you can create a New Warehouse.
Warehouse : Name of the Warehouse.
Short Name : This can be 5 characters long and it is used on the different warehouse documents.
Address : You can select an existing company or you can create a new one. Therefore, the address of your warehouse will be the same as the one of the company you selected. After the creation of a new warehouse, you can go back to the Dashboard/Odoo Inventory Overview.
You will see the new operation types automatically created due to creation of a new Warehouse.
After setting up the warehouse, we have to configure Locations.
Locations : Location is the specific place within the warehouse. It can be a sublocation of your warehouse as a shelf, a floor, etc. Therefore, a location is part of one warehouse and it can not be linked to multiple warehouses. One can create multiple locations and sublocations such as shelves, racks etc.
To go on locations you can go to Inventory > Configuration > Locations.
When you click on Locations, you can see the below screenshot.
Locations are very important to configure as we need to make sure for the inventory where it has been stored and where it went to.
As we have created some of the locations and we need to configure for all the locations from where we are getting the stock(Vendor Location) which is already configured, where we are sending the stock(Customers Location) is also configured.
However if you want you can create more locations for Customers and Vendors. Similarly we have locations for scrap or Inventory loss.
These are virtual locations and do not exist in our accessibility. We can also create internal locations where we are sending the goods internally. If it is consumed it should be a production / customer location otherwise the stock will be shown as still existing in stock.
When you click on any of the locations in the list you can see the below screenshot.
You can see the additional information tab here, when you click on the Location Type you can see the type of locations. You can see this in the screenshot below.
Vendor Location : This is used for the Supplier’s Location. This location is treated as your virtual location from where the products you receive in your stock.
View : This is always a parent location. When you have a hierarchy of locations it is always advisable that you keep the parent location to be viewed as the transaction of the goods will happen to the children which do not have any further subordinate locations.
Internal Location : It’s a location which is available internally in your stock. You can have multiple locations where you can keep your stock. Here you will maintain a hierarchy as discussed before so that you will get an accurate inventory value for the stock that you have.
Customer Location : It’s the location of customers where actually you are delivering the goods from your stock. This is also a virtual location which you just imagine to use when you are selling the goods.
Inventory Loss : It’s the location which is used when you have scrap products or lost products or when you adjust the inventory of books with real time inventory. The adjustment moves are having this type of location.
Production : It’s the location where actually the products are being consumed for manufacturing or any other reason. A restaurant or kitchen can be treated as a production location when the goods are being consumed.
Transit Location : It’s the location which is used only for transit. For e.g. a Quality check location or Packing Location or when you use Pick Pack Ship the locations can be used as transit locations.
You can select the right type that matches the location which you’re trying to create.
Operation Types : Operation types are the types of operation that are used in terms of transferring goods from one location to another. With the Odoo 15, a new feature is introduced into warehouse management called Operations type.
There are mainly 3 types of operation
1. Receipt,
2. Delivery and
3. Internal Transfer.
To go to the Operations type, go to the Inventory > Configuration > Operation Types.
When you click on operation types you will come to the image showing below.
Select the operation type whether Receipts, Delivery, Internal transfer.
Click on any type of operation you want to configure and the Odoo system will give you the configuration space as shown in the screenshot given below.
You can set the Reservation method from here as highlighted in the screenshot given above. This option is basically for scheduling or is a reservation method for Delivery orders or manufacturing orders on the basis of reservations that can be considered as: At confirmation, Manually or Before Scheduled date. The, Before schedule option, allows you to easily set the reserve days for the delivery order before scheduling the Order.
Putaway Rules : Putaway is the process of taking products off the receiving shipments and directly putting them into the most appropriate location.
To go to the putaway rules, go to the Inventory > Configuration > Putaway Rules.
When you click on Putaway Rules, you can see the screen below in the screenshot.
Now there are no Putaway Rules, you can create it according to your needs.
Product Categories : As the name describes, categories are used to categorize or classify the products in different sections. You can create or configure as per your requirements.
This list will open for product categories, you can create a new product category also. If you create new product categories, this type of form will open and you have to fill in the information and create a new product category.
Units of Measure : There are multiple options available in the Odoo system for configuring and using units of measurements. Handling products in different units of measure is necessary sometimes. Measuring systems vary across countries and units of measure feature of the Odoo system helps to overcome the confusions that the measuring systems create in the customers around the world. Configuring this option is easy.
To configure the Units of measure, go to the Inventory > Configuration > Settings.
When you click on settings below the screenshot image will be open.
You have to enable the Units of Measure, shown in the below screenshot.
When you click on Units of Measures you can see the below screenshot.
You can view all of the units available in the Odoos system from here. Odoo allows you to create and configure your units of measure. If you want to create a new measure of unit then you can click on the create and make a new one like this below screenshot.
